Thursday, May 1, 2014

MODI I HAVE KNOWN-BY Uday Mahurkar #DECODING #HINDUISM

A day before the Gujarat poll result, Narendra Modi presided over his Cabinet meeting to discuss some government schemes with colleagues. He was his normal self, seemingly unaffected by the euphoria created by exit poll surveys just two days before. His ministers were not surprised. For they are by now used to Modi's "work is worship" style.
Within Modi's tough exterior resides a cool, calm and sensitive loner, who even pens poetry once a while. Modi has no real friends. Perhaps work is his only true friend. He often feels hurt when faced with negative reactions. When I went to interview him in the aftermath of his 2002 victory, I saw tears in his eyes as he told me: "Why has the media seen me only through one prism? I have maintained the highest form of integrity in Indian public life. Unfortunately, the media never appreciated me for this. Why?"

Modi's sensitivity is at best illustrated by some of his initiatives in the health sector. When I went to the state government-run U.N. Mehta Heart Institute recently to do a story on health issues, I was surprised to find a brand new building rivaling that of the privately-run Apollo. A senior health officer told me Modi had increased the budget of the hospital-where heart surgeries for students and below poverty line families are performed for free-from Rs.1 crore to Rs.60 crore in the past decade. In one of its wards, I found seven school children between the ages of 8 and 12, who had undergone free open heart surgeries under a government scheme that treats school-going students, poor or rich, for free, in state-run hospitals.
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